Declan Cassidy is founder and executive director of EurAV European Audio Visual CLG
Declan Cassidy is a social film maker and former journalist. He is founder and executive director of EurAV European Audio Visual CLG – a non-profit organisation that uses audio-visual production and training skills to support social objectives including media literacy. Declan’s interest in media literacy began when he left school in Finglas during the 1980s at a time when the area was facing social challenges brought about by a housing policy that had seen a rapid population explosion from little over 400 residents to 53,000 in just two decades without the social resources in place to support such growth. Despite many positive community-driven initiatives, the media coverage of Finglas focussed on the anti-social aspects, leading Declan’s career guidance teacher to advise the use of a relative’s address outside of Finglas on any job application if he were to have a hope of it being considered. It was Declan’s first exposure to the devastating potential of misinformation, disinformation and malinformation. As a result, Declan launched a successful community newspaper aimed at presenting a balanced viewpoint that came from people within the area. One early journalist on this publication was a 12-year-old children’s page columnist who is, today, RTE’s Samantha Libreri.
Declan’s career has never strayed from social and community media. He moved from journalism to documentary film making and from that to drama after he was commissioned by Amnesty International to create human rights film. His 2008 Irish Film Board-funded short “Whatever Turns You On” – the story of a Dublin homeless man – qualified for Oscar consideration when it won Best Short Film at Aspen, USA and his films have since won numerous awards. In 2009 he directed an eight-part BAI-funded drama series on media literacy called ‘The House’ for Dublin Community Television. He has been a member of DCTV since it was founded and presently sits on the management committee. In 2020 he established the non-profit communications organisation EurAV. It is based in Drogheda where it has training facilities and a small green-screen studio to support community media production and capacity building so that, in the same way that he tackled the problems of misrepresentation in Finglas, communities can exercise their own authentic voices without the danger of interference from malevolent actors. EurAV is currently developing an online social channel, TVM1, centred on the communities along the M1 motorway that stetches from North County Dublin to the border on the East Coast. Declan continues to produce social programming under the Coimisiún na Meán Sound and Vision initiative, and EurAV is currently engaged in five EU-funded projects, including DiSeRA – a project involving EurAV and organisations in Italy, North Macedonia and Slovakia, which is aimed at supporting digital media literacy for older people in rural areas.
Declan can be found on social media platforms under the ‘handle’ of @DeclanCreative. Aware that the ‘Generation Z’ demographic do not frequent traditional media channels, he has worked to reach them through TikTok where he now has almost 20,000 followers.
Declan’s website is declancreative.com and EurAV can be found at eurav.eu
